Power corrupts, makes you stupid, and does other things.

“Great men are almost always bad men,” said Lord Acton – – the corollary to his more famous admonition “that power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

But now hot, bothered and excited comes the ‘breathtaking’ news that the powerful not only lean toward corruption but that they also tend toward the stupid. Was such research really necessary? A passing acquaintance with the personages mentioned on this blog or a mere glance at the daily news already confirms this.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Besides, over a century ago without benefit of such exhaustive research, Friedrich Nietzsche in Twilight of the Idols already concluded that “power makes stupid.”

And just 18 years ago, Forrest Gump gave us the populist erudition “Stupid is, as stupid does.”

But if nothing else, to paraphrase H. L. Mencken‘s definition of puritanism, researchers are undoubtedly gripped by the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, might know the obvious.

So power leads to the stupid as well as the corruptible and lest we also forget, Lord Acton said it led to moral hypocrisy, too. But wait, there’s been a study that had to corroborate that, too, “The psychology of power: Absolutely.”

My favorite aphorist, François de La Rochefoucauld, knew all this as well. And like Nietzsche, he knew it without benefit of research back in the 17th century that “L’hypocrisie est un hommage que le vice rend à la vertu” or “Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue.”

But alas, before wearing out completely from further redundant inquiry into the conspicuous vices and tendencies of the powerful, there’s one more – – –‘Avaritia facit bardus‘ meaning greed makes you stupid. And doubtless, there’s a study somewhere on that, too.